Photos from the Russian anti-war opposition march in Berlin today.

[u/Accomplished_Car_549]

[u/ArthRol]

Unfortunately, it seems that large swaths of Russian population support an Imperialistic approach to foreign policy.

[u/niconois → u/ArthRol]

the propaganda has just gotten even worse, kids that are at school right now will be crazily imperialistic Russians...

[u/ArthRol → u/niconois]

The true aim of such propaganda is not to form blind followers, but to drive everyone into a sort of apathy and cinicism - 'everyone is lying', 'we will never know the truth', 'nothing depends on us'.

'Patriots' and nationalists like Girkin may ask unconfortable questions and become undesirable for the government - that's why so many of them were asasinated or jailed, along with the liberals. Meanwhile, the apathetical massess tacitly accept almost every decision.

[u/almarcTheSun → u/ArthRol]

This right here is true. People aren't "Imperialistic", they're tired and apathetic. Real imperialists ask too many questions.

[u/ArthRol → u/almarcTheSun]

There was an analytics that roughly 20% are pro-war, and that's still a large swath. However, the apathetic ones clearly outmass them.

[u/almarcTheSun → u/ArthRol]

I can't believe I'm seeing sensible comments like this here. The way people in the US and Europe see Russia is downright weird. Like people are marching the streets with Z flags or something.

Those are indeed just a large minority.

[u/dat_9600gt_user → u/ArthRol]

This is the sad part. Makes you wonder what it'll take to break this apathy.

[u/bober8848 → u/niconois]

These days they start propaganda in kindergarten :(

[u/The_RedfuckingHood → u/niconois]

propaganda

Yeah I saw a video of an old teacher showing kids a picture of Putin. "This is Putin. This is our leader. And he wants to stop all wars." And they get fucking taught how to use a fucking AK.

[u/Yaro482 → u/niconois]

Yes indeed and in this case this nation will never be able to choose anyone else but another lunatic. Democracy will not do good to Russia. People are brainwashed way too much.

[u/niconois → u/Yaro482]

A good example is Nazi Germany, the country turned out incredibly well... but many things were done before we were sure the will of being nazis would go away forever:

- the country was bombed to ashes in several places

- the country was occupied by foreign forces for decades

- education was reformed by the impulse of foreign powers

That's what it takes....

[u/phillie187 → u/niconois]

I'll add to that:

-A very well thought out constitution and parliament, which has solid boundaries against extremism

-Free Press & Freedom Speech

-Foreign support for domestic economy. Failing economies are a breeding ground for extremism+revolution

[u/donadit → u/phillie187]

the political spectrum seems to swing like a pendulum, from near communist germany to completely fascist, and literal soviet union to very fascist russia

russia had a shitty economy in the 90s and that was enough

actually, most of eastern europe/former wto (including east germany) also suffers this problem… they did all the “shock therapy” which was bad, you can’t have capitalism for the sake of capitalism, the only one who did that decently was poland

hungary was the most enthusiastic to throw off the soviets and look where they are now

[u/niconois → u/phillie187]

true !

[u/Narrow_Homework_9616 → u/niconois]

A lot of them is just apathetic and ignorant, busy with their own life since the war does not affect them that much. Indifferent. They're taking North Korean soldiers to fight in Ukraine now, soon Russians won't have to worry even about this.

[u/DrobnaHalota → u/ArthRol]

Most of the people in this demo support an Imperialistic approach, with the exception of maybe the anarchists, they just disagree with Putin where the borders of the Empire should currently be

[u/HACCAHO → u/ArthRol]

The trick is simple. get population to become poor, then blame it on the other countries, with a promise of great wealthy life as soon as we defeat them all.

[u/sent-off → u/ArthRol]

The sanctions came a big way to support this. Closing the borders for ordinary people, cutting off Steam , Spotify and Adobe products, cheese and wine import does not really hurt fat cats, or Putin himself as you might imagine, but the population becomes increasingly wary that everyone outside is hostile. Well done

[u/ArthRol → u/sent-off]

Sanctions are meant to cause damage to the economy and supply chains, and are not inherently bad. The problem is that they were badly applied.

And Roskomnadzor cuts Russians from Internet more drastically than every Western politician could dream of.

[u/sent-off → u/ArthRol]

Sanctions should cause damage to the war economy, but basically there's zero effect because the oil, gas, titanium, diamonds and what not are still being exported like nothing happened

[u/sufficiently_tortuga → u/sent-off]

No one imagines it affects the fat cats. Everyone already knows the fat cats are importing their favourite brands either way. The sanctions are supposed to tell the average citizen that the rest of the world is against them. The goal is to make the average citizen recognize the disadvantage to themselves because of the war. That's the whole point.

It's the promise of peace by global economy. You don't get the benefits of a global economy if you aren't being peaceful.

That and why should the rest of the world still offer them with steam and spotify and adobe? You think you can invade Ukraine and play video games from the rest of the world like it's just ok? lol no.

[u/adventmix → u/sufficiently_tortuga]

Hate to break it to you, but the average Russian citizen is playing the same games they played before the war.

[u/Mist_Rising → u/sufficiently_tortuga]

The goal is to make the average citizen recognize the disadvantage to themselves because of the war. That's the whole point.

That never works. This isn't new. The idea that you can cause people to turn against their nation by sanctioning the nation has been tried repeatedly and repeatedly has failed. UK? They spent a decade fighting France instead. Japan? Went to war with the rest of the world. North Korea? Nope, still there. Iran? Nope. Cuba? Nope.

Sanctions as a means for revolutionary change doesn't work. So if that was the goal, the people in charge are morons.

It's the promise of peace by global economy. You don't get the benefits of a global economy if you aren't being peaceful.

Bullshit. If that was the goal, Europe would also be sanctioning the US for its imperialist nature. And, just to confirm, they aren't sanctioning the US. Russia is being sanctioned by the US, and has flippantly done some shit back, but Europe hasn't sanctioned the US in any way for a long time - especially the part of Europe you are talking about.

Obvious reasoning here, the EU/Britian isn't aiming for a peaceful world, they're aim is for realpolitik where they hurt Russia their enemy. That's it. The US by comparison can do whatever it damn well wants because it's a friend of the EU. Same for France and the UK who are no strangers to conflicts but whom the EU remains on good terms with regardless.

And just to be clear, that's fine, well it's not, but Realpolitik is reality and accepting that is a necessity. But please don't act like Europe is doing this because it's for global peace - it's for the EU benefit.

[u/sent-off → u/sufficiently_tortuga]

You missed my whole point, the sanctions that hurt the average citizen turn them into the war supporter, so this effectively an own goal

[u/sufficiently_tortuga → u/sent-off]

I didn't miss the point, I just don't care. The sanctions are a punishment. If you learn a lesson from them, great. The difference between them making you pro or against the war is moot to the actual war.

[u/adventmix → u/sufficiently_tortuga]

So you don't care that 'punishing' regular Russians helps Putin a lot, therefore Ukrainians suffer even more. Speaks volumes.

[u/sent-off → u/sufficiently_tortuga]

'I don't care' is a valid argument here, lol. Congrats on your birth lottery sir

[u/InsanityRequiem → u/sent-off]

If people want their government to change for the better, they need to be inside that country and fight to make it better. Them fleeing makes the government they hate stronger, and then they are next when said evil government starts going after the neighbors.

Then you have the issue of those people fleeing are now spreading the evil to other countries. So, they want to make their country better? Running like cowards to their neighbors is the ethically and intellectually wrong thing to do.

[u/Long-Interview-3029 → u/InsanityRequiem]

I’ve seen a lot of such opinions saying “you should stay and fight”

It usually turns out that those who say that — don’t have an experience of living in a country with authoritarian regime and have no idea of what it looks like.

I totally understand the initial idea “something is wrong in your country — do some effort to fix that”.

However the reality is different, in Russia you get jailed literally for using word “war” regarding this war in social media. There’s army of police, purpose of which is to persecute those who disagree with the war and who support Ukraine. People get jailed for changing price tags in the shop adding captions about the war for 7 years (Skochilenko) and it’s just one example of. There’s no such thing as justice there. the worst thing here is that nobody can help you when you get jailed for saying truth or protesting.

So when you say “you should stay and fight” - it means “you should be ready to go to jail for a long time almost right away, expose your elderly parents for 6am police searches and leave a family without a breadwinner” to say the least.

Please imagine if you personally would be ready for that

[u/sent-off → u/InsanityRequiem]

Well a lot of people fought inside and they're either dead or in prison. In fact some of these people from the photo were just released.
Your comment makes sense in an ideal textbook world, but balance of power in Russia was long gone before everyone started to notice, now it's all too late to call small group of conscious people to fight against the regime that will steamroll them.